Hollow Faith
by Schermionie
Summary: Fred dreamt big, and sometimes it drove George mad, how much faith he put in the goodness of the world. - Fred/George oneshot, for echoing noise.


Disclaimer: _Harry Potter_ doesn't belong to me. Quite obviously, I should say.

Prompts: 'Hollow faith' (from echoing noise at the Bunnies, Tamed thread at The Slytherin Corner) and 'air' (January 13th's prompt from Daily Prompts From the Mods at the Harry Potter Fanfiction Challenges Forum).

A/N: So. Twincest. This is dedicated to the lovely echoing noise, who gives astonishingly inspiring prompts and made me want to write this pairing again - after over four years of thinking I was finished with it. pippi55 has also contributed to this, but for this particular fic, it was all Paige.

I'm really very nervous about posting this. If you read, please review. Your thoughts might mean more to me than you know.

* * *

He was always the dreamer. Floating up, and up, and up, and up. With his infectious grin and pluck, with his ability to see _past_ reason, his big dreams would come to _life_. Lights. Colour. Noise.

Even when he was quiet, his light was just as intense, and the combined beating of your hearts was loud enough to mask the aching silence.

"It's okay," he would tell you, grinning assuredly but speaking softly because _you_ were _so_ _scared_.

"No, Fred," you'd reply sharply, not allowing yourself to be soothed because _one_ of you had to remember, "we're at war."

"It's okay," he'd repeat, as if all the bad things would just vanish with that phrase. "We'll be okay."

Fred dreamt big, and sometimes it drove you mad, how much faith he put in the _goodness_ of the world.

* * *

You were always the realist. Planning, not dreaming; building strong foundations for your pranks, not walking on the fluffy clouds of imagined success. Together you were an unstoppable force of chaos - alone, two lights flickering, never quite reaching great heights. If you ever rose without him, it was like steam rises, hissing against the air then _disappearing_.

"You're just trying to run away, George," he'd tell you, and it would be like a slap in the face coming from _him_ - the dreamer, the imaginer, the one who couldn't understand that falling in love could be falling out of grace. The one who couldn't admit that _this_ wasn't the right thing.

"I would if you'd let me," you'd reply, never mind that it wasn't true - because you knew that he'd already forgotten that this wasn't some joke, some thing you could pass off, and you needed to remind him of that before you _drowned_ in him and forgot what this was yourself. "Because this isn't right, Fred. It's wrong. It's _disgusting_."

He'd flinch, and then there'd be that desperate moment when either of you could have pulled away and left some hollow space between you.

But you wouldn't. Fred was lost in dreams, but you needed those dreams so badly that you let them drag you down. Down to a place so deep you couldn't find your way out. Down to a place so twisted, so _polluted_, so dark, so WRONG that any way of breathing was grasped onto, that any faith was _something_, that any light was blinding, numbing - especially the shining emerald that eventually took your real light away.

* * *

You were always the realist. But you got lost. Lost in his dreams, his infectious grin, his faith in the goodness of a world you were only making more rotten.

You said so many things but the one thing. The thing that saturated the air between you when you stopped wanting things to be real - the thing that hurt and healed you when your jokes and smiles fell flat, and Merlin, _someone else died today_ - the thing that had you falling down, and down, and down, and down - the thing that filled you when the devastating _warmth_ of him made you _shudder_ until you _couldn't_ see anything at all - be hurt or healed - have any thoughts or feelings but the certainty that you must have always been falling if you could feel _so fucking good_ at reaching rock bottom.

The truth you never said was that this wasn't even about him, or you. All you were doing was clutching onto something that you'd always had faith in, always known and been close to. When everything supporting you was landsliding down, when everything solid and real was _crumbling_ in your hands, all you needed was a little faith in the goodness of the world.

And when you didn't believe in that goodness, clinging to someone who did was the only thing that made sense.

* * *

He was always the dreamer. Floating up, and up, and up, and up. In the middle of a battle he could stand still and smile, and you claw at your eyes because now you can't stop dreaming of it yourself. You're surrounded by an empty bed, and the cold rips at you, and your lonely heartbeat's too quiet to hear without his one beating with it, and. this. dream. is. _death_.

Lights.

Colour.

* * *

.


End file.
